Mercy Global Concern - 2004

Human Rights for children and women: How UNICEF helps make them a reality.

Mercy Global Concern: Briefing Paper Number 1, February 2004

The renewed global commitment to the realization of human rights is transforming the way governments protect their people. This recent positive trend is nowhere more visible and powerful than in the nearly universal ratification of the Convention of the Rights of the Child (CRC) and in the very wide embrace of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).

Reflecting their profound concern for children, governments have ratified the CRC more quickly and in greater numbers than any other human rights instrument. And governments have gone even further, enacting legislation, creating mechanisms and putting into place a range of creative measures to ensure the protection and realization of the rights of children. As a result, children everywhere are benefiting from the renewed efforts to ensure the fullest achievement of their rights to life, healthcare, education, nutrition, a basic standard of living and to special measures for their protection when they are threatened by violence, abuse and exploitation.

Alone, no human rights convention can eliminate neglect, abuse or violations of human rights. But the application of CRC and CEDAW principles, now the driving forces behind UNICEF's work for children and women, can deepen and make real the world's resolve to end conditions that lead to crimes against humanity and the denial of people's fundamental rights and freedoms. By honouring their binding commitments to children and women, governments can transform the human rights vision of human dignity, equality, peace and security into a universal reality.

For UNICEF, a human rights framework strengthens and builds on the organization's long tradition of programme development and practical actions to make life better for children. This approach enhances the organization's ability to address the needs of disadvantaged children. It does so by improving UNICEF's understanding the circumstances that deny children access to basic services and create inequality, discrimination and conflict. UNICEF is guided by the principles of CRC and CEDAW in its continuing efforts to influence public policies in ways that prioritize children's needs, develop and assist programmes benefiting children and stimulate public dialogue on issues that affect children's loves. The organization also monitors and publicizes the status of children's rights and reports on progress, viewed through a human rights lens.

CRC and CEDAW, as well as other human rights instruments and treaties, are blueprints from which the world can craft a human development agenda that secures the rights for all.

Guiding Principles of CRC and CEDAW

States voluntarily acknowledge and accept obligations when they ratify human rights treaties. In doing so they agree to implement these treaties and to be accountable for meeting the rights and providing for the needs of the people within their jurisdiction. The State also recognizes a person's right to participate fully and equitably in the civil, political, economic, social and cultural life of the State. Finally, ratification requires States to align their domestic laws with treaty provisions and to ensure that steps are taken to make structures in society, at national and sub-national level, respond in a way consistent with the letter and intent of the law.

CEDAW and women's human rights

The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) is the most comprehensive and detailed international agreement, which seeks the advancement of women. While it builds upon the existing international human rights machinery, CEDAW points out that those treaties were not sufficient to guarantee the full enjoyment and exercise of women's human rights. CEDAW applies to females of all ages since no specific group is specified. For UNICEF it is important in the focus on girls.

An example that illustrates how interrelated women's rights and children's rights are is infant mortality. A significant percentage of infant deaths -particularly those that occur in the first 28 days after birth - are attributable to the poor health and nutrition of the mother during pregnancy and in the post birth period. In some cases, neglect of a female infant due to cultural attitudes of son-preference results in a higher mortality among female infants. Also well documented is the strong positive correlation between women's literacy and girls' educational levels. Women who have experienced the benefits of education themselves are in a better position to make decisions on the education of their children, especially their daughters.

Equally important is the centrality of women's human rights to the overall achievement of human rights. This needs to be understood from the perspective of women's individual and collective rights and the implications women's inequality has for the achievement of human development goals, beyond those associated with women's reproduction and caring functions. Women and girls constitute just over 50 per cent of the populations of most countries and if their political and social participation is disproportionately low or altogether lacking it means that half the population is not represented.

The World Conference on Human Rights held in Vienna (1993) declared the human rights of women and girls as "an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of the universal human rights." The Platform for Action of the Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing (1995), reaffirmed this and outlined specific objectives and strategies for the implementation of these rights. In many countries, CRC and CEDAW have led to calls for specific actions to eliminate discrimination and reduce gender-based disparities. Some examples include:

• Special policy measures for girls' education, with, in some cases, girls' education and vocational training being linked to employment opportunities for women.

• Legal reform for guaranteeing a child's right to nationality and women's right to inherit property, measures critical to the care and development of children, particularly in war- affected areas.

• The right to information on reproductive and sexual health issues, for adolescent boys and girls.

• Recognition of harmful cultural practices such as female genital mutilation as a violation of girls' right and not as a health hazard.

• Recognition of sexual exploitation and gender-based violence against girls as a violation of rights, leading to legal measures for punishing the perpetrators and for protecting vulnerable groups. In some places, new programmes of family support services provide incentives for education and employment.

• Child-care facilities for protecting the best interests of the child and providing support to women's economic participation.

• Collection and analysis of gender- and -age disaggregated information for monitoring the implementation of CRC and CEDAW.

Participation and empowerment.

A human rights approach recognizes that women and children should be central actors in their own development. The goal of development is therefore central to create conditions that allow them to participate more fully in community life and in the creation of policies that affect them. Such a focus also helps to create a climate for the broader acceptance of human rights principles and leads to national policies and value systems that recognize human dignity, value tolerance and acknowledge the rights of people to be partners in the development of their communities. From a human rights perspective, broad participation is both a means and an end. CRC and CEDAW stress participation rights in particular, since traditionally women and children are those most marginalized and excluded from the processes of mainstream society.

While governments are a principal partner in the process of empowerment, groups from civil society that share common values are also an essential partner in the process. For this reason, the alliance with civil society organization is not an alternative to working with governments, but a cornerstone of the effective private/public collaboration essential to CRC and CEDAW implementation. The well-being of women and children is heavily determined by what happens in the private sphere of their lives: within their families, households and communities.

Parents normally have the first line of responsibility to provide for a child's basic needs, to protect the child from harm and to create a family environment that is conducive to the child's optimum development. Often, this primary responsibility for the care and protection of children falls disproportionately on the shoulders of women: mothers, sisters, aunts, grand-mothers. But beyond a child's family a vital role is providing for basic services, and is the place where schooling and wider social interaction takes place. Then, beyond the community, regional and national bodies have the responsibility to create broader contexts for the enjoyment of children's rights UNICEF and the agencies of the UN system have the responsibility to support countries' efforts to implement their treaty obligations, and when appropriate to remind State Parties of such obligations. UNICEF programmes of cooperation are part of the international community's response to the realization of children's and women's rights.

Human Rights and UN reform

According to the UN Charter, human rights are about respecting, protecting and fulfilling the inherent dignity of the individual as well as promoting the ability of each individual to reach his or her full potential, in the context of equality, self-determination, peace and security. The Charter and all international human rights instruments constitute a clear and compelling development agenda for both individual countries and for the UN system.

Duly ratified human rights conventions constitute legal obligations for a country. For the UN system, they define its ultimate purpose and rationale. In his 'Programme for Reform', Secretary General Kofi Annnan emphasizes that human rights are "inherent to the promotion of peace, security, economic prosperity and social equity" and calls for the integration of human rights into all principal United Nations activities and programmes.

January 2004